Announced only recently by Qualcomm, the Snapdragon 821 processor will debut on the ASUS Zenfone 3 Deluxe in what appears to be a last-minute change.
Originally set up to have the Snapdragon 820, the ASUS Zenfone 3, which happens to be the top-tier version of the new line of smartphones from the company, is getting the 2.4GHz processor instead.
With this change, the ASUS Zenfone 3 Deluxe should be ahead of the pack when it releases, add to that the fairly impressive Adreno 530 GPU on board as well.
The ASUS Zenfone 3 with the Snapdragon 821 processor will be available with 6GB DDR4 RAM and up to 256GB of internal storage.
It is important to note that although a Snapdragon 821-powered version is available, ASUS will still offer Zenfone 3 Deluxe units with Snapdragon 820 under the hood.
These units will have two configurations – 4GB of RAM with 32GB storage and 6GB of RAM with 64GB storage capacity. Both are certified for Google's Daydream VR platform.
As for the rest of the specs of the ASUS Zenfone 3 Deluxe, users are looking at a 5.7-inch 1080p Super AMOLED protected by Gorilla Glass 4 and a massive 3,000 mAh battery that juices up to 60 percent in just 40 minutes.
In the imaging department, users will get a hulking 23MP rear-facing camera complete with optical image stabilization and focus time of 0.03 seconds. There's also a fingerprint scanner to go along with it.
The ASUS Zenfone 3 Deluxe with the Snapdragon 821 processor is priced at $780 while the 6GB version with 64GB of RAM has a $560 price tag. The entry-level Deluxe version with 4GB is at $500.
The ASUS Zenfone 3 Deluxe will be released in Taiwan and Hong Kong as early as next month while the Snapdragon 821 processor-powered version will be available at a later date.
